The tale of a City Supernal-- The whisper of Something eternal-- A passion, a hope and a vision That people the silence with Powers; A fable of meadows Elysian Where Time enters not with his Hours;-- Manifold are the tale’s variations, Race and clime ever tinting the dreams. Yet its essence, through endless mutations, Immutable gleams. Deathless, though godheads be dying, Surviving the creeds that expire, Illogical, reason defying, Lives that passionate, primal desire; Insistent, persistent, forever Man cries to the silences, “Never Shall Death reign the lord of the soul, Shall the dust be the ultimate goal-- I will storm the black bastions of Night! I will tread where my vision has trod, I will set in the darkness a light, In the vastness, a god!” As the skull of the man grows broader, so do his creeds; And his gods they are shaped in his image, and mirror his needs; And he clothes them with thunders and beauty, He clothes them with music and fire. Seeing not, as he bows by their altars, That he worships his own desire; And mixed with his trust there is terror, And mixed with his madness is ruth, And every man grovels in error, Yet every man glimpses a truth. For all of the creeds are false, and all of the creeds are true; And low at the shrines where my brothers bow, there will I bow too; For no form of a god, and no fashion Man has made in his desperate passion But is worthy some worship of mine; Not too hot with a gross belief, Nor yet too cold with pride, I will bow me down where my brothers bow, Humble, but open eyed. _Evening Sun_ _Don Marquis_ THE BEST POETRY OF 1914 I. TEN BOOKS OF POETRY FOR A SMALL LIBRARY. [* Certain volumes of new poetry and collected editions are drawn to the individual reader’s notice by an asterisk employed to indicate special poetic distinction.]